


All the Best Stories To Tell

by rivlee



Category: Spartacus Series (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-09
Updated: 2013-05-14
Packaged: 2017-11-20 16:24:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/587372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rivlee/pseuds/rivlee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Saxa, Lugo, and Nasir's friendship through the war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> From a tumblr prompt by zeldafaulkner. Title from Frank Turner's _The Ballad of Me and My Friends_.

When time was still spent under temple roof, Naevia was counted closest to Nasir among all friends. She was still dear to him but circumstances had changed. Naevia stood now at Crixus’ side, often traversing the paths up to the north. Nasir was here with Agron in the south, keeping their seaport occupied. Gannicus was the one who traveled between here, Spartacus’ central command post, and Crixus’ northern one. It’d been too long since Nasir had time to sit with Naevia and discuss anything besides supply lines.

Through Agron and Donar’s lessons, Lugo’s half-shouted translations, and a whole set of hand gestures, Nasir and Saxa had befriended each other. Saxa understood Latin though she often refused to speak it unless required. Nasir understood some of Agron’s German, a unique dialect to his clan that wasn’t, of course, spoken by Saxa. They somehow managed to make it work and now they spoke, like so many did under Agron’s guidance, a mixture of Latin and the Germanic common-tongue. 

It helped, on warm days with a light breeze coming off the sea, to have such a friendship. It made the current round of guard duty more entertaining. Gannicus, Spartacus, and Agron were all huddled up inside with their maps and wine. Saxa and Nasir watched over the door so they wouldn’t be bothered.

There was a tall brunette woman helping to load a cart whose eyes kept straying in their direction. Agron’s feeling towards Nasir were well known to all, a mark of equal joy and frustration to Nasir, and the woman did not look to be that much of a fool. No, her eyes kept lingering on the strands of Saxa’s golden hair, drifting lower to where they fell around her breasts.

Nasir tapped Saxa’s arm and cocked his head. She looked around him and grinned in the woman’s direction. The woman giggled and fumbled the bag of grain in her hands.

“Go speak with her,” Nasir said. “She is of a form and can’t take her eyes off yours.”

“I must stand guard,” Saxa said though it was clear her mind was already on more pleasurable things.

Nasir scoffed. “We have a system you and I, do you not recall?”

Saxa nodded. She picked up a small rock and hurled it past Lugo’s head. He woke-up with a start.

“Take over,” she ordered.

Lugo grumbled but stumbled over to them. He stretched out his arms and rested against the stone wall. “One day I shall have a woman. Then you must do this for me.”

“Big dreams for such a little man,” Saxa teased. She turned to Nasir and grabbed him, pressing a friendly kiss to his lips. “Gratitude, brother.”

Nasir clapped in approval as Saxa successfully secured her target.

**********************

The loss of Mira was still a wound that stole Nasir’s breath when he had time to dwell. She was dear to him, the closest of friends, in those last months. She understood him in ways none other had since Chadara. She was a sister, one he could laugh and gossip with, share frustrations with, stand back and watch Naevia take the steps to healing herself with pride. 

Nasir felt her absence keenly even now as he attempted to sort housing and food for their ever expanding horde. Agron seemed utterly convinced Nasir could do such a task on his own. Nasir now knew Agron had never been in charge of running a household. It took a whole team of workers to accomplish tasks that appeared easy. It was especially difficult trying to explain this to the rest of their group. So few of the freedmen and women that now followed them were former house-slaves from lavish villas. Nasir almost felt himself buckle under the burden of trying to live up to the power and competence of Mira’s shade. 

“You stare holes into table,” Saxa said.

Nasir almost wept at her appearance. Saxa _was_ life. She was fire, passion, anger, joy, defiance, and death. She was fierce and always beautiful, even when covered in blood, sweat, and dirt. Since Spartacus had divided the forces to cover more ground, she had become a source of salvation. She was also one of the reasons Nasir hadn’t dropped a crate of amphorae on Gannicus' head. Would it kill the man to write one decent report?

“Too many people and too little supplies,” Nasir explained.

“We can raid,” Saxa offered.

Nasir shook his head. “I would not risk it, not with only Donar left to lead. We need him here if the Romans attack.”

Saxa tugged on the ribbon holding back Nasir’s hair. “We could send message to Agron. Order him to return with meat and cloth.”

“I know of none who would reach him in time,” Nasir muttered as he shuffled the lists. There would likely be mutiny if he tried to ration the wine. He supposed he could order people to double up on sleeping pallets but the lice problem was already bad enough. 

Saxa slapped Nasir’s ass. “You doubt me? I know how to ride better than any fucking man in this camp.”

Nasir laughed at her. He cupped Saxa’s cheek, a gentle action that she allowed out of friendship. “I would lose all sense without you.”

Saxa kissed his nose. “You love Agron. Sense has never been yours.”

She was gone before he could stop her. 

 

*****************************

 

It had come to this, near death on a mountain top. Nasir was starting to despise mountains. He was so cold even huddled in between Agron and Saxa; his teeth would not stop chattering. Agron and Saxa were muttering low in their tongue and Nasir couldn’t concentrate enough to translate. His head felt full and his very eyes hurt. Nasir tried to take a deep breath but a hacked coughed poured out of him instead. 

“Come,” Saxa tugged on his arm. “Closer to the fire.”

Nasir looked around in confusion. Agron was gone. When did the fire start? They were in an open field now when before they leaned on rock. Saxa half-carried him through the snow and sludge stopping at some makeshift shelter. 

“None know better than our kin how to survive in this land,” Saxa said. “We must get you heavier furs. Agron is hunting. I will follow later and get you a truly glorious pelt.”

Nasir wanted to laugh but it felt like his bones were trying to shake out of his skin.

“None of that,” Saxa ordered as she wrapped her arms around him. “We will see this to the end, together. You will not leave me to suffer with these fools.”

It was an order Nasir knew better than to disobey.


	2. Travelling Woman

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A history of a woman as wild as the sea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I needed more Saxa fic in my life. So I decided to keep on with this, because I need more friendship fic as well.

Saxa came from the lands far to the north where winter long reigned. She grew up near the cold waters of the coast, forever lulled to sleep by the voice of the sea. Mother always claimed she was a child of its breeze, as unruly as its roar. 

Their family had no sons; her father never saw it as a failing, he raised Saxa, his eldest, to take the world into her own hands. She was never forbidden from trying whatever task she set mind towards. She learned the knives and the needle; building and birthing; every task and lesson needed to survive in the harsh land they knew as home. 

She was captured when caught in a skirmish among the Gauls. Saxa was on a journey to meet her new husband, the son of a powerful Chieftain, when war and slavers took her on a different path. Whether the collar of slavery or the lock of matrimony, the path of Saxa’s future was out of her own hands. It was an experience that left her full of rage. The slavers thought to use her and the other captured women for their pleasure, but her mother taught her well to fight with no weapon. She gave them all deep bites and scratches; let them know they should thank their own gods for knives being taken from her hands. Saxa did not need iron to kill, though it was convenient. She would rather see death than spend a life at the side of the shits who took her. The men didn’t even have the courage to get close enough to her to break her neck. They caged her behind a set of bars. She saw it as a temporary problem. There was enough slack on her chains to use it to strangle if required. 

She growled at the possible buyers who came on their ship, only to feel genuine surprise when a man speaking in the southern dialect conversed with one of the others. She could feel the tension in the air, that still feeling right before action, and reacted immediately. 

Finding herself among a rebel camp, embroiled in someone else’s war, was not Saxa’s plan for her future. She enjoyed it, this different sort of freedom. This world was so different from her own, and there was much to be found under the hot sun and in the warm sand. She did not understand the words around her at first, but actions always suited her best. She stayed among those who could speak the Common Tongue of her people while keeping her eyes on the others. There was a rough a start, friendship was not easy among those who watched them with suspicion and did not understand their gestures of friendship and loyalty. Time, wine, and a good sporting fight would see that amended. She looked back on those days with some regret for the short friendships that deserved more time.

Saxa discovered more of herself on those sands than she expected. Oenomaus taught her much like her father had; he did not see weakness in her as a woman, just another fighter to be trained. She found a powerful ally in Agron, one of the leaders under Spartacus. Mira and Naevia weren’t comfortable around her at first, she knew her manner was completely foreign to them, but they soon thawed and mutual respect grew. Nemetes was a fine distraction for a time. She left him once she realized he did not understand that strength did not mean cruelty. A Roman may have thrown the axe that killed Mira, but her death weighed on all of them. To be so faithless to one she swore oaths burned in her soul. She would not turn from her warrior’s path again. Gannicus was an enjoyment; a man who understood she did not always want tender. Saxa could be gentle, and often was when time called for it, but she would always be the unruly child of the chill ocean breeze. She’d always revel in a partner unafraid to match her blow for blow. 

There were others she found who helped complete her life in different ways. Saxa held little to the notion that she would see home again. She was no child to cling onto the past; she looked towards a glorious death as a warrior. She would die defending her friends, her new family, and taking out as many of the enemy as she could along the way. The fight itself was enough reason for Saxa. She’d take the spoils of war as they came, but she knew there was no return from this; even if the gods did see her out of it alive, how could she return home? She would no longer be their Saxa. She was no longer the little girl who tried to run with the wolves though remained untouched from the battle. She was no longer the type of woman who would easily settle into a marriage bond and another clan. Saxa had seen and tasted of the wider world. 

In Nasir she found the brother she always lacked. He reminded her of her mother; gentle eyes and soft lips that spoke words which would obey at all costs. He could just as easily turn deadly. Others called him a wild dog, but no, he was like the wolves she admired as a girl. Beauty from a distance, gentle around his mate, fierce around any who threated his family or territory. He did not seek her company just for sex, or a warrior, or for what she could bring to him. He sought her friendship, her comfort, and to be her strength when she needed to lean. 

Finding herself was the most valuable thing she would take from this war; finding Nasir would be a close second. 

The snow was thick around them as they made every last attempt to cross the mountains into the Gauls’ territory. They’d run from Crassus, Spartacus’ body quickly pushed over edge into water where it could not be desecrated by any save the gods’ hands, only to find Pompey and his forces after them. They’d lost thousands to Pompey. Now their group stood a mere ten and Nasir was fading fast with each night spent out in the blistering cold of the mountain top. Saxa would not lose her brother to this; he would survive to the end, and she would make it so. There were plans for a new life, in a new territory east of the Rhine.

“Take him,” she informed Lugo as she reluctantly released Nasir. “Keep him warm at all costs.”

“Where do you go?” Lugo asked.

“To see if the pelts are dry. We need more furs and skin on him.”

Lugo shook his head. “The boy is not made for our lands.” His words mocked even as his eyes were full of concern.

“We will make him for them then,” she hissed. “I leave you to keep him alive. Do not fail me in this.”

Lugo nodded and wrapped his arms around Nasir without further protest. Saxa retied the cloths wrapped around her feet and pulled her cloak tight as she set out into the cold. 

She was Saxa, daughter of the Northern Lands, and child of the wild sea. She would bend the world to her will or die in the effort. She would not allow failure in their survival, not when freedom from Rome was so near.


	3. Beyond the Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Lugo's turn to speak.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For an anon on tumblr who requested an expansion of Lugo as seen in the first chapter of _Two Nights_.

Family was everything to his kin. Family held your histories; they were the most valuable coin to a people who lived far from city walls with little more than sheep for company. All the clans knew war, and loyalty to their chieftains, and to their clan. They did not often come together, the different clans, as one force. The Roman fucks forced it upon them. On the boat where they were kept chained up, Lugo stood among all different people who came from lands east of the river’s boundary. He was one of the few who spoke their captor’s tongue; a skill picked up from trade with wandering Romans and a handful of fucking Gauls. 

Sedullus had the build of a leader, and the ambition. Lugo would follow him, if they ever managed to break free from the chains. There was a girl, kept behind bars, who also had the spirit of a leader, though she was still too young of years. 

Lugo did not like the sea. He cared little for its stench or its salt on his skin. He missed his forest home, far removed from the heat and choppy waves. He did not like the creaking sound the ship made, or the creatures he swore he heard roaring in the water. He was a man of land, and should not meet his death in such a place.

Things changed when hooded strangers arrived at their current port. One spoke their Common Tongue, with an accent trace from the southern wilds. He spoke slowly, as if the tongue of his birth was uncommon to him now. It mattered not if he spoke as one of them or as a Roman; blood and freedom were things Lugo understood in any tongue. 

***************************

The abandoned temple was behind them, smoldering after the battle, and the world was ahead. Lugo gave the sky above them a glare. He did not wish to burn from its rays and turn red again.

“Wear this, you mad fuck,” Nasir said. He threw a cloak at Lugo. “I don’t want to hear your kin grumbling about sunlight from here to ends of the world.”

Lugo was grateful for the gift, and hastily pulled it over his head. The heat was worth the protection from the sun. Lugo wondered just when he’d come to regard the little man more highly than his shield-mate, or their proclaimed leader. Nasir did not lead with words, or the fight, though he had both. He saw needs and filled them without having to be asked. He was as a second-or-third-in-command should be. Lugo knew he was not so high in hierarchy. Spartacus came first, with Agron at his side, Donar answering for Agron. Crixus held position just under Spartacus, only truly concerned with Naevia, and the few Gauls and Gladiators who still lived. Gannicus was his own man. Lugo needed a leader though, a clan head he could follow who would answer to their King. He chose Nasir, and stuck to his side as Spartacus called for men to scout ahead.

“You come with me?” Nasir asked. 

Lugo nodded.

“Do not fall to slumber this time,” he ordered.

Lugo laughed as he patted Nasir’s smaller shoulder. “We stand as brothers now.”

************************

Donar always held watch over Agron, since the death of his brother, Duro. When true war came to them, Lugo took watch over Nasir. First Lugo thought it only to see a fellow kinsman and warrior happy, but he found, with time spent in company, Lugo’s brotherhood bond and love was truly more for Nasir. He still felt loyalty to Agron, for the man who had initiated his freedom from chains, but Lugo _knew_ Nasir. He spent hours training with Nasir, witnessing firsthand his mastering of the spear.

Lugo would see them both to happiness, but Lugo remained closer to the former body-slave. Agron spent most of his time with Spartacus, Crixus, and Gannicus huddled in tents removed by more than just status from the muddy ground where they trained and fought the new recruits. It was Nasir who took the time to better Lugo’s grasp of the Romans’ tongue, who survived the frustrating challenge of explaining to Saxa why she needed to speak it, who at times took more interest in them than Agron, their claimed kin. 

Now they found themselves inside city walls by a sea, and Lugo felt that same stifling in the air as he had on the boat. This city bred madness, and he would be eager to leave these walls. Hopefully not by ship, though he’d favor any escape. Lugo had little love for the pirates though, even if Castus tried to entice him with games, smiles, and drink. Lugo found little joy in making new friends when so many ended up among the dead. 

Nasir was often displeased these days, a sour tilt of lips he only allowed when eyes were turned from him. Agron was more obvious in his anger, even slighting Nasir in earshot of the others. Saxa looked ready to attack, but Lugo held her back.

“He will not want us to know.”

“You heard Agron’s words. Everyone knows,” she disagreed. 

“You are young,” Lugo said as he attempted to ruffle her hair. “Nasir must speak his own words in this, and he will in time.”

“We cannot all be as old and boring as the fucking trees,” Saxa said. She looked over her shoulder and narrowed her eyes at a young girl around the corner. “You follow Nasir, I must handle things.”

The sea only brought madness, and none could tell Lugo otherwise.

****************************

Things had changed since their talk on the mountain pass, and even Lugo was at a loss over how to approach Nasir now. To most he still looked composed, seeming to take joy in the company of his friends and in his duties to Spartacus. With Crixus, Naevia, and Agron gone, Nasir had risen in the ranks. He held the position Agron once had, and Lugo found himself, along with Castus and Saxa, where Nasir once stood. It made Lugo miss Donar, and Mira, and all who had come before them. None of the trio were from these lands, this culture, or raised among the tongue. There were nuances and gestures they’d never understand. They tried, and Belesa, Sibyl, and Laeta offered their aid when possible, but communication had started to break down.

Nasir was brimming with fury, confusion, pain, and Lugo waited for signs of fallout. They shared a tent now, when Lugo slipped from arms of whatever woman would greet him. Lugo kept watch over the fitful thing Nasir had claimed as rest. His face had grown harder; the softer looks of the still-healing boy he met only a year ago faded with months of war and absent friends. 

“I will still take you to my clan,” Lugo said.

Nasir laughed. “Do you think our gods will still see us from this war? We are all marked for death.”

Bitterness was not a familiar thing on Nasir’s tongue. His hands tugged at the belt upon his waist and he wound it up, burying it at the bottom of his pack. “We are not the men we once were.”

“We are still brothers,” Lugo said.

Nasir raised his head, and for a moment a familiar smile graced his lips. “We always shall be,” he agreed. “If we do survive this, I will go to your lands, though what once waited for me is no longer.”

“The sheep will greet you with joy,” Lugo said. He wrapped his arm around Nasir’s shoulders. “Come! We shall drink and tell the children of the fearsome Oenomaus, and of Donar with his war axe. We shall speak of Mira and her bow, and how it has saved our fucking lives even though we once mocked it.”

Nasir grasped Lugo’s hand. “Gratitude, brother. You offer comfort even when I refuse it.”

Lugo laughed. “I always knew you for a stubborn fuck. What should change?”

Lugo could not bring Agron back. He could not undo the hundreds of major and minor wounds Nasir had endured throughout his life, but he could support a leader, a brother, and a friend.


End file.
